Defensiveness obviously isn’t immoral, but it’s not “inaction”. A “hackles raised”/”defensive” energy is something one is actively “doing to” the social field, it’s not an absence of action. It’s a purposeful increase in internal/relational tension, and an increase in the strength of one’s boundaries to reduce vulnerability (i.e. let less information through, like conspicuously not mentioning relevant stuff). So this to me looks like adversariality, i.e. polarization.
Yepp, this basically seems right (and insightfully phrased). I do consider my original reply (the “Is there something specific” one) to be pretty defensive, and a mistake for that reason (as was Zack Davis’ original reply upthread).
I think the main problem with my other replies is that they weren’t direct enough in owning that defensiveness. For example, me saying “in hindsight when I asked the question I was implicitly conflating “distasteful” with something stronger like “reprehensible”.” was a kinda half-assed (and still defensive) attempt to say something like “lol that was a silly question for me to ask, point taken” and wrap up the thread. Obviously it totally failed to do that.
(Having said that, I don’t endorse “maybe better not to reply since doing so is already energetically participating in the collective polarization pattern”. People reread LessWrong for a long time, and ducking out is rightly seen as some evidence that you have no response to give. Better I think to just wait longer before replying, or take more time on a reply.)
There’s something broader going on here where I would like to figure out a more trusting attitude towards LessWrong. One part of that is just becoming less defensive on an emotional levle, but another is that there’s a bit of a clash in epistemic approaches. One way I’ve previously summarized it is that I’m more like a diffusion model and other rationalists are more like sequence models. That is, I’m starting off by trying to become confident about the highest-order bits, in a way that is locally less careful but IMO globally more careful (c.f. my comment above on “general-purpose suppressant of novel thinking”). I do think this lack of local carefulness has led me astray in the past (as I’ll recount in some upcoming parts of my retrospective) and fixing it is one of my main priorities, but it also feels very helpful in jumping out of memetic traps. Probably the main action item here is to try to learn from people who have been both controversial and rigorous, like Charles Murray (other suggestions welcome).
pretty defensive, and a mistake for that reason (as was Zack Davis’ original reply upthread).
What do you think would have been the superior play for me in that situation? When someone is deploying a “distasteful” epithet without specifics, I think asking for specifics (forcing them to take a stand on which side of the fact/value boundary the distaste is supposedly on) is the natural follow-up. (And then after he answered that fact-beliefs themselves aren’t culpable, there was nothing to do except thank him for answering the question.)
Both your questions and mine felt very pointed. I think questions can be asked from a stance of genuine curiosity, versus a stance of “justify yourself!”, and the difference is very noticeable and also changes the dynamics of the resulting conversation significantly.
If I’d had that curious stance, for example, I would have scrolled the DoD feed and then agreed that it was distasteful, saving myself from what has turned out to be a fairly unproductive and time-consuming thread.
I think the main problem with my other replies is that they weren’t direct enough in owning that defensiveness
Yeah, I had something like this intuition as well but wanted to keep it simple in my original comment. One might more precisely say that there’s some intrinsic adversariality in any ideological conflict, but the lever is more about not being reactive about it, processing it before putting it back into the world, making it conscious/overt so our system-2 can deal with it, etc. And that this generally leads to less intense polarization (since it will be more about high-level beliefs and less (though still nonzero) about deep gut-level emotions).
(Having said that, I don’t endorse “maybe better not to reply since doing so is already energetically participating in the collective polarization pattern”. People reread LessWrong for a long time, and ducking out is rightly seen as some evidence that you have no response to give. Better I think to just wait longer before replying, or take more time on a reply.)
Yeah that’s true, agreed now that you say it—I didn’t think of that option some reason.
I’m more like a diffusion model and other rationalists are more like sequence models. That is, I’m starting off by trying to become confident about the highest-order bits, in a way that is locally less careful but IMO globally more careful (c.f. my comment above on “general-purpose suppressant of novel thinking”
That’s interesting, though I’m not sure I understand it well. What gets lost if I round this off to “more explore cognitive patterns, and less exploit ones”?
Thanks for the comment!
Yepp, this basically seems right (and insightfully phrased). I do consider my original reply (the “Is there something specific” one) to be pretty defensive, and a mistake for that reason (as was Zack Davis’ original reply upthread).
I think the main problem with my other replies is that they weren’t direct enough in owning that defensiveness. For example, me saying “in hindsight when I asked the question I was implicitly conflating “distasteful” with something stronger like “reprehensible”.” was a kinda half-assed (and still defensive) attempt to say something like “lol that was a silly question for me to ask, point taken” and wrap up the thread. Obviously it totally failed to do that.
(Having said that, I don’t endorse “maybe better not to reply since doing so is already energetically participating in the collective polarization pattern”. People reread LessWrong for a long time, and ducking out is rightly seen as some evidence that you have no response to give. Better I think to just wait longer before replying, or take more time on a reply.)
There’s something broader going on here where I would like to figure out a more trusting attitude towards LessWrong. One part of that is just becoming less defensive on an emotional levle, but another is that there’s a bit of a clash in epistemic approaches. One way I’ve previously summarized it is that I’m more like a diffusion model and other rationalists are more like sequence models. That is, I’m starting off by trying to become confident about the highest-order bits, in a way that is locally less careful but IMO globally more careful (c.f. my comment above on “general-purpose suppressant of novel thinking”). I do think this lack of local carefulness has led me astray in the past (as I’ll recount in some upcoming parts of my retrospective) and fixing it is one of my main priorities, but it also feels very helpful in jumping out of memetic traps. Probably the main action item here is to try to learn from people who have been both controversial and rigorous, like Charles Murray (other suggestions welcome).
What do you think would have been the superior play for me in that situation? When someone is deploying a “distasteful” epithet without specifics, I think asking for specifics (forcing them to take a stand on which side of the fact/value boundary the distaste is supposedly on) is the natural follow-up. (And then after he answered that fact-beliefs themselves aren’t culpable, there was nothing to do except thank him for answering the question.)
Both your questions and mine felt very pointed. I think questions can be asked from a stance of genuine curiosity, versus a stance of “justify yourself!”, and the difference is very noticeable and also changes the dynamics of the resulting conversation significantly.
If I’d had that curious stance, for example, I would have scrolled the DoD feed and then agreed that it was distasteful, saving myself from what has turned out to be a fairly unproductive and time-consuming thread.
Cool, makes sense!
Yeah, I had something like this intuition as well but wanted to keep it simple in my original comment. One might more precisely say that there’s some intrinsic adversariality in any ideological conflict, but the lever is more about not being reactive about it, processing it before putting it back into the world, making it conscious/overt so our system-2 can deal with it, etc. And that this generally leads to less intense polarization (since it will be more about high-level beliefs and less (though still nonzero) about deep gut-level emotions).
Yeah that’s true, agreed now that you say it—I didn’t think of that option some reason.
That’s interesting, though I’m not sure I understand it well. What gets lost if I round this off to “more explore cognitive patterns, and less exploit ones”?